In defense of the corn-maze mom

Here at Mommy Prayers headquarters and cider-donut repository, every day feels like a maze of one sort or another, so I feel compelled to come to the defense of the hapless family currently being ridiculed nationwide for calling 911 to be rescued from a corn maze. (Punchline: They were only 25 feet from the entrance, ba-da-dum.)

They’re catching especial hatred for having a three-week-old infant with them, with comments along the lines of “who brings a newborn to a corn maze at dusk?” and “those people should not be allowed to procreate,” etc. etc.

It’s not till you read that they also have a preschooler that the story makes more sense — and boy, did it bring back some baaaaad memories.

For about three weeks after the birth of his brother, Firstborn was a child possessed. He wouldn’t play, wouldn’t be read to, refused to watch TV, wouldn’t cuddle, couldn’t nap, just physically could not settle down for one moment of peace.

In dealing with this suddenly crazy child — on top of the feeding, changing, and night-waking with a newborn — Mr. Mommy Prayers and I definitely made some whacked-out decisions.

I remember standing at the bottom of a playground slide one frigid winter Sunday, weeping openly. It had taken us literally the entire day to get out of the house, between one child or the other melting down, or needing to sleep, or be fed, or changed. I was wearing the baby, but it was so cold and he was so still, I was sure he was dead. Meanwhile, his insane brother stood at the top of the slide, refusing to come down, even as the light faded and the temperature dropped. Believe me, if I could have moved my fingers, I would have called 911 to get that kid off that slide.

So take pity on the corn maze family. Probably they woke up exhausted that morning and said, “What the hell are we going to do with these kids all day? Let’s go to the corn maze. That will be fun.”

12 hours later, not fun. At which point they say “f*** it, call 911.” Too bad the cops didn’t interrogate the big brother, because dollars to donuts, he’s the one that made them do it.

5 Responses to “In defense of the corn-maze mom”

Way back in 1902, when dinosaurs still roamed the earth, my grandparents moved from Falmouth to Harwich on Cape Cod. They’d packed all their belongings in a wagon, covered themselves with a buffalo robe and headed out one bitterly cold late November day. It was to be an all day trip with the horse slowly pulling such a heavily loaded wagon. In those days the Cape Cod roads were covered with crushed shells. My grandmother had her six month old son in her arms. Part way down the Cape he began to cry and cry and cry and cry. She was sure he was freezing even though they had the buffalo robe. She wiggled around, shifting her clothes and put him inside all her clothes, against her warm body…he searched around, found the nipple and shut up. He wasn’t cold, but he sure was hungry!!

Another story… One day a friend and I took three of our children to the zoo. We’d planned on nearby Stoneham Zoo for a morning visit. It was closed that day! So, off we went to Boston to Franklin Park, after all, we ‘d promised the two eight year olds a zoo. I had my baby with me…maybe four or five months old at the time. No extra diapers..but I did have a bottle of milk. Before the day was out, I took off the cloth diaper, wrung it out as hard as I could, and put it right back on her. Not my usual way of keeping the baby dry! We didn’t get home till late afternoon!!

You learn a lot being a Mom, that’s for sure! Love reading your stuff.

What really amazes me about this story is that the “owner” of the maze left without finding out if everyone was out of the maze! Don’t they have a parking lot they could check, and then maybe send someone who knows the maze to check up on people?

I can totally understand the panic of the couple with two kids being stuck in the maze after it got dark.